Nicole Curato

Twelve Key Findings in Deliberative Democracy Research

This essay reflects on the development of the field of deliberative democracy by discussing twelve key findings that capture a number of resolved issues in normative theory, conceptual clarification, and associated empirical results. We argue that these findings deserve to be more widely recognized and viewed as a foundation for future practice and research. We draw on our own research and that of others in the field.

Flirting with Authoritarian Fantasies? Rodrigo Duterte and the New Terms of Philippine Populism

ABSTRACT This commentary aims to take stock of the 2016 presidential elections in the Philippines that led to the landslide victory of the controversial Rodrigo Duterte. It argues that part of Duterte’s electoral success is hinged on his effective deployment of the populist style. Although populism is not new to the Philippines, Duterte exhibits features of contemporary populism that are befitting of an age of communicative abundance. This commentary contrasts Duterte’s political style with other presidential contenders, characterises his relationship with the electorate and concludes by mapping populism’s democratic and anti-democratic tendencies, which may define the quality of democratic practice in the Philippines in the next six years.

Improving deliberative participation: connecting mini-publics to deliberative systems

This article argues for the assessment of deliberative mini-publics as a dynamic part of a wider deliberative system. The approach draws primarily on Dryzek’s ( 2009 ) deliberative capacity building framework, which describes the democratic process as ideally involving authentic deliberation, inclusiveness in the deliberative process, and consequentiality or deliberation’s influence on decisions as well as positive impact on the system. This approach is illustrated using the comparative assessment of two mini-public case studies: the Australian Citizens’ Parliament and Italy’s Iniziativa di Revisione Civica (Civic Revision Initiative). The application of deliberative capacity as a standard for evaluating mini-publics in systemic terms reveals differences between the cases. The deliberative capacity of both cases overlap, but they do so for different reasons that stem from the interconnections between their specific designs and other components of the deliberative system.

Appreciative and contestatory inquiry in deliberative forums: can group hugs be dangerous?

The project of deliberative democracy is increasingly pursued through designed mini-publics. But exactly how they are designed proves crucial in determining whether or not mini-publics can deliver on their promise. This article explores the role of appreciative inquiry – a version of deliberative design that is gaining ground. In this approach, participants are primed to develop an ‘appreciative gaze’ by focusing the discussion on what already works well in the system and imagining possibilities for building on these strengths. It is distinguished from contestatatory approaches in that argumentative, blame-seeking and deficit-oriented forms of discourse are considered counter-productive to the process. We argue against a one-sided emphasis on appreciative inquiry, which must be balanced with more contestatory forms. Focusing on appreciative approaches to deliberation at the expense of contestation obstructs the ability of a group to deliberate properly and secure crucial deliberative outcomes. Our analysis is grounded in the case of the first Australias Citizens’ Parliament.

Inclusion as Deliberative Agency The Selective Representation of Poor Women in Debates and Documentaries about Reproductive Health

Mass media play a double-edged role in promoting deliberative democracy: they enforce hierarchies in public discussion by prioritizing the voice of particular groups, yet they remain the best, if not the only institution that can temper inequalities in deliberation, particularly in their capacity to grant ordinary people opportunities for voice in deliberative settings. We put forward two criteria that can assess media’s capacity to enforce inclusiveness in public deliberation. A mediated deliberative system is inclusive if it (1) proactively gives visibility and voice to vulnerable groups to be seen and heard on their terms and (2) allows those with less power to act as “deliberative agents” capable of facing their interlocutors, articulating, defending, and considering one’s views. We provide empirical context to this argument through the case of the Reproductive Health debates in the Philippines, as they played out in two different television genres that differently accentuate deliberative agency.

Deliberative democratization: a framework for systemic analysis

In the transition literature, ‘free and fair elections’ is often treated as the most important indicator of democratic quality. In this paper, however, we argue that ‘free deliberation among equals’ is in many respects a more telling measure. On the face of it, this argument might strike one as implausible. After all, the decisive moment in many transitions is the signing of a pact between elements in the government and opposition who are more concerned to protect their own interests than to explain themselves to others. Yet while pacts may not be particularly deliberative, they still occasion a great deal of deliberation across society as a whole. We argue that the different sites where deliberation occurs can be understood as forming a deliberative system. To give substance to this idea, we then outline a systemic framework that may be used to describe and evaluate the deliberative capacity of transitional regimes. Finally, we turn to the cases of Venezuela and Poland to illustrate the empirical application of this approach. Both transitions were founded on a pact. Yet differences in the nature of those pacts and the broader deliberative systems in which they were located tell us a lot about where those countries are today.

Deliberative capacity as an indicator of democratic quality: The case of the Philippines

The theory and practice of democracy have moved on from the paradigm of electoral democracy to conceptualising alternative models that can facilitate democratic deepening in different contexts. Methodology should follow too. In this piece, I build on Morlino’s framework, which takes a step towards a pluralised assessment of democratic qualities but remains largely hinged on the electoral model of democracy. I suggest that Morlino’s heuristic tools can be further sharpened by incorporating a deliberative democratic criterion. I provide an empirical illustration through the Philippine case – a country that already exhibits formal features of electoral democracy but fails to translate democratic impulses into democratic deepening.

Respondents as Interlocutors Translating Deliberative Democratic Principles to Qualitative Interviewing Ethics

The epistemic interview is a conversational practice, which aims to generate knowledge by subjecting respondents’ beliefs to dialectical tests of reasons. Developed by Svend Brinkmann, this model draws inspiration from Socratic dialogues where the interviewer asks confronting questions to press respondents to articulate the normative bases of their views. In this article, the author argues that Brinkmann’s model is a valuable methodological innovation but warrants further development. The author suggests that the epistemic interview can be put on a stronger methodological footing when the Socratic model is complemented by developments in democratic theory, particularly its deliberative variety. Translating deliberative democratic virtues to methodological terms addresses some of the epistemic model’s gaps, including an account of the dynamic of knowledge production and the ethical norms that govern this method. To illustrate the practice of epistemic interviewing, the author draws on her experience in interviewing junior military officers.

‘We haven’t even buried the dead yet’: Ethics of discursive contestation in a crisis situation

Disasters are often described as exceptional moments that demand global solidarity. A ‘state of humanitarian exception’ emerges as citizens foreground norms of compassion and cooperation while contestatory discourse – the argumentative, blame-seeking and fault-finding forms of speech – are stigmatized as inappropriate interventions in a society seeking to recover from a distressful crisis situation. This article critically unpacks these representations of post-disaster situations empirically and normatively. By analysing the discussions in the public sphere over the first 100 days after Typhoon Haiyan battered Central Philippines, the article examines the moral force behind the ‘discourse of compassion’ and its ‘ethical boundary work’ that places the ‘discourse of contestation’ outside the scope of acceptable conduct. It proposes that the discourse of compassion’s ethical boundary work is only democratically acceptable when one takes a short view of a crisis situation. Drawing on deliberative democracy theory, the article argues for the importance of contestatory discourse in fostering inclusive discourse formation and ensuring that the state of humanitarian exception does not become the rule.

Beyond the spectacle: slow-moving disasters in post-Haiyan Philippines

“At the mass grave, girl” said my key informant, when I asked her where she wanted to meet one Tuesday afternoon in Tacloban City, Philippines. She sounded blasé when she said this, as if she asked me to meet her in the market or the town plaza. Nothing in her tone indicated that it had been only two years since, on November 8, 2013, more than 6000 people perished from Typhoon Haiyan – one of the strongest storms to make landfall in recent history. Two thousand two hundred of these casualties are buried in the Holy Cross Memorial Park where she wanted to meet. For ethnographers, this seemingly mundane encounter provides a window into disaster-affected communities’ everyday experience years after a spectacular tragedy. While international media and humanitarian organizations have not fallen short in drawing attention to Typhoon Haiyan’s devastation, little is known about how everyday life unfolds once journalists and humanitarian workers parachute out of a disaster zone. Do disaster-affected communities “build back better,” as the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction envisions? Or do citizens get accustomed to forms of suffering caused by dispossession, abandonment, and collective trauma? These lines of inquiry inspired this thematic focus on “Slow-Moving Disasters in the post-Haiyan Philippines.” We hope to shift the gaze from spectacular disasters to ones that are “neither spectacular nor instantaneous but rather incremental and accretive.” While there have been scholarly investigations on the causes of Typhoon Haiyan as well as the global community’s immediate response to the tragedy, Haiyan’s legacies warrants a closer look.